Police release name of suspect in shooting rampage

1of8Police work the scene of an accident Wednesday morning on the feeder of Hollister at 290 inbound that happened when a triple shooting suspect fled police. After the wreck, the suspect was shot and killed by police.Photo: Melissa Phillip, Houston Chronicle

2of8Police work the scene of an accident Wednesday morning on the feeder of Hollister at 290 inbound that happened when a triple shooting suspect fled police. After the wreck, the suspect was shot and killed by police.Photo: Melissa Phillip, Houston Chronicle

3of8An HPD patrol car had two of its back passenger windows shattered.Photo: Melissa Phillip, Houston Chronicle

4of8The body of a shooting suspect shot and killed by officers lies on the ground as police and emergency crews work the accident scene.Photo: Melissa Phillip, Houston Chronicle

5of8Residents walk near the scene of a triple shooting at the Wilshire Place apartments at 6000 Hollister Wednesday morning. A suspect in the shooting was later shot and killed by police officers.Photo: Michael Paulsen, Houston Chronicle

6of8Police work to free people from a vehicle Wednesday morning that was struck by an SUV driven by a suspect in a triple shooting. The suspect was shot and killed by police following the wild chase that ended on the feeder of Hollister at 290 inbound.Photo: Melissa Phillip, Houston Chronicle

7of8A woman who declined to give her name watches the scene of Wednesday's wreck. She said her roommate was trapped in an SUV that was hit by another SUV being driven by a suspect in a triple shooting.Photo: Melissa Phillip, Houston Chronicle

8of8An HPD patrol car had two of its back passenger windows shattered by flying bullets.Photo: Melissa Phillip, Houston Chronicle

Authorities have identified a man who went on a shooting rampage at an apartment complex and then had a shootout with police during a chase before he crashed a stolen sports utility vehicle into cars and died on the frontage road of the U.S. 290 Wednesday morning.

Also, police said the man had originally be thought have wounded three people at the complex, but now investigators have determined there was a fourth victim.

The suspect has been identified as 39-year-old Patrick Oneal Spurlock, according to the Harris County Institute of Forensic Sciences. He died at the scene of the crash on the inbound service road of the Northwest Freeway near Hollister about 20 minutes after the chase began.

Police said Spurlock was thought to have wounded three men at the Wilshire Place condominiums about 8:50 a.m. But now, police say, he also wounded a fourth man who was taken by medical helicopter to Memorial Hermann-The Texas Medical Center. He was in critical condition. His name has not been released.

He also wounded the complex security guard and maintenance man as well as another man who was grazed by a bullet during a failed car-jacking.

When detectives compared notes after investigating the apartment shooting and other scenes where shots were fired, they realized that the man had wounded a fourth victim, said John Cannon, a spokesman for the Houston Police Department.

Police don't know what sparked the gunfire. They said Spurlock was a tenant at the complex but had been asked to leave by the security guard. Spurlock pulled out a gun and shot him. Then he shot the other men. The fourth victim was driving in his car in the parking lot when he was wounded.

Police said after the four men were wounded, Spurlock ran from the complex into the median of Hollister. An officer in his squad car responding to the shooting spotted him. Spurlock opened fire on the officer, who returned fire. No on was hit by the bullets.

Spurlock ran away and car-jacked a woman outside another apartment complex at 6969 Hollister. He then drove in her blue Chevrolet TrailBlazer. Police chased him. During the chase he stopped the stolen SUV more than once, put it reverse and rammed patrol cars following him as well as opened fire on them. The officers returned fire.

After he backed into squad cars in the U-Turn lane of the 290 feeder road near Tidwell, he continued onto the inbound service road. He was weaving on the road and sideswiped the freeway retaining wall before slamming into cars stopped at a traffic light on the service road at Hollister.

The impact caused a chain-reaction crash, sending five people to area hospitals. At least one of the people has been released from the hospital.

Dale has worked at the Houston Chronicle as a reporter since 2000, when he moved to Houston from New Mexico. As a General Assignment reporter, he has covered criminal and civil trials, City Hall matters, environmental issues and many other news stories. He also has written human-interest features. Among his stories are breaking news reports from New Orleans during Hurricane Katrina and from Galveston during Hurricane Ike. He also reported from east Texas during the Columbia Space Shuttle disaster. Currently, he handles breaking news, including homicides, fires and other fast-breaking stories.